“Danae”

"Water Snakes II”

In “Danae,” 1907-8, the female form is natural and beautiful, soft and curvaceous, diffused with warm light and tender glow. Her story is classical—trapped in a tower by her father to preserve her virginity and stop a deadly prophesy from coming to pass, Danae is visited by the god Zeus in the form of a golden shower and subsequently impregnated, fulfilling the prophesy despite her father’s pains. Danae is simultaneously gloriously innocent and overtly—though apparently unintentionally—sexual. Curled up like a child in a warm, flowing cocoon, the young maiden is at once a victim and a temptress. “Danae,” along with the undeniably sensuous “Water snakes II” of 1904-7, show woman as an overtly erotic creature with a “seemingly inexhaustible capacity for carnal bliss.” The Water Snakes drift fluidly in a sea of sexual satisfaction, sinuous serpents feeding off desire and fulfillment.